Online Blackjack – Bad Strategies Exposed!

Hopefully by now readers of these articles will be well aware of the correct basic strategy when playing online Blackjack. Your knowledge of the game should have improved and you understand what to do in certain situations. However many new players who do not have the same level of understanding have created or adopted their own unique strategies while playing Blackjack. These strategies may seem somewhat logical to a novice player, but the reality is they are deeply flawed and will lead you to lose money over the long term. Let's take a look at some of these bad strategies.

One interesting strategy you may see from novice players if you are sitting at a live dealer table is the "never bust" strategy. The idea behind this strategy is that the novice player has worked out that when they bust they lose money, so they avoid busting at all cost! Sounds logical enough? Their plan is to stand on any hard 12 or higher, and simply hope that the dealer busts every time. The problem with this strategy is that the dealer doesn't bust often enough for this to be profitable long term compared to the correct play of hitting your hand. The house edge increases to nearly 4% using this strategy, so it's definitely a bad idea, but there are worse…

Another poor strategy that you'll find novice players using is to "mimic the dealer". In this strategy the novice player thinks that since the dealer plays a certain way then that must be the best way to play. Again this sounds logical enough for the uneducated player. They will hit with 16 or less, and stand on 17 or more, including soft hands. The major flaw in this strategy is that the player will never split or double down, since the dealer never does this. This leaves huge opportunities for profit behind on the table as doubling down and splitting are two of the more profitable weapons for a Blackjack player. Mimicking the dealer increases the house edge to nearly 5.5%, so it's clearly not a good idea!

A third strategy is to "assume the dealer has a ten" which is as warped as it sounds. Under this concept the player will assume that the dealer will always have a ten as his hole card and play accordingly. Sure, the dealer often holds a ten but in reality it will only be roughly one-third of the time, which in turn means that two-thirds of the time you will be playing your hand incorrectly. This bloats the house edge to over 10% which makes this strategy a terrible one.

Another odd Blackjack play that you will occasionally see from novice players is to stand on soft hands such as an ace-4. Of course the ace can be played as a 1 or 11, so even if you draw a ten on your next card you still won't go bust. Novice players often do not understand this seemingly simply concept and will often be too scared to hit another card for fear of busting. Understanding the power of the ace is an important concept and standing on soft hands is a huge mistake.

Remember to never play Blackjack in fear of busting your own hand. You need to think more about making winning hands rather than simply avoiding busting. Jump onto the tables at one of your favorite online casinos such as 32 Vegas Casino, Euro Grand Casino or Skykings Casino, and if you see a novice player using one of these flawed strategies then you may want to let them know about this article - just make sure you don't fall into the same traps!

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